The only way this hockey game could bully off worse is if they flew the Falkland Islands flag instead of the Argentinian one. No, hang on, the Falklands flag is our flag, with a sheep on it; so it could only be worse if they flew our flag twice, with an extra sheep.

Great Britain won the toss. If only all conflict could be resolved like that. It would scarcely be less fair than a war, and so much faster. Yes, it is against the spirit of the Olympics to bear old grudges, but I put it to your honour that they started it.

On the 30th anniversary of the sinking of the Belgrano, an advert appeared entitled Olympic Games 2012: Homage to the Fallen and the Veterans of the Malvinas. I know, what kind of an advert even has a name? A very naughty advert.

The Argentinian hockey midfielder Fernando Zylberberg had snuck onto the Falklands under the pretext of running a marathon there, and in the middle of the night filmed a rather beautiful sequence of himself training on the islands that the Argentines call Malvinas. They named it after St Malo, the French birthplace of the 18th-century settlers. You'd think, if they felt that strongly about it, they'd have called it something Argentinian.

But I am trying not to be too tribal, even as the tension mounts between the footsoldiers of this geopolitical ballgame.

On a bright blue pitch, the anthems play. No trouble so far, unless you count the fact that none of the Argentine players know the words to their own anthem. Ah, it appears that it has no words.

The play starts with scrupulous politeness, which I put down to the restraint shown by all sensible people when they are holding big sticks. I think they should introduce big sticks into all the main sports.

One minute from the end, with GB leading one-nil, things turn a bit more sour; Nicholas Catlin gets a green card, for an offence I couldn't decipher, but I was sure was Agustin Mazzilli's fault. Never mind, this is what umpires are for.

In the advert, Zylberberg did press-ups on the sand, ran past English-looking shops in an unEnglish-looking landscape and – the kicker – did step-ups on the famous Port Stanley war memorial, erected in honour of those killed in the first world war. He rubbed our noses in not one war but two; the fact that we won them both notwithstanding, this was obviously intended as an insult. His punchline: to compete on English soil, we are training on Argentine soil. Take that, little Englanders! First I am going to reclaim your tiny island for my press-ups, and then I'm going to whup your asses at a sport immortalised by the pranksters of St Trinians.

At that point, the midfielder had the support of Cristina Fernández de Kirchner; indeed, he made the ad on behalf of her presidency.

She was obviously still high on hatred for David Cameron, after he accused her of colonialism in January, which takes some brass neck from a man whose very cheeks look full of the fruits of other people's labour.

But this will not fly in the Olympics, and an example had to be made; coach Pablo Rossi withdrew Zylberberg from the training rota, which left him unable to come to the games – Rossi cited "sporting reasons", and said that Zylberberg "had not been able to complete all the necessary steps in pre-season".

Yes, he did step one – some press-ups – but missed out the next steps: keep your head down; don't mention the war; and whatever you do, don't retake Port Stanley.

You would have looked long and hard for signs of chagrin at the match itself, however – two slim streaks of light blue shirt ignited the interest of a hooligan specialist for a second, but they had perfect manners. Fernández had expressly banned further mention of the islands from the Games, and if the team or its supporters had any worries, it was that they might be witness to some of our famous British ultraviolence.

Naturally, even those of us who know almost nothing about stick sports know that this isn't how a hockey crowd works.

Plus, there was a little brass four-piece in the stands, with an apparently emollient intent – playing Tony Christie songs, none of that Jerusalem.

It didn't do any harm that we won; we won at the beginning, and in the middle, and near the end. This was no foregone conclusion – as Jason Lee, the coach, pointed out afterwards, "We lost to Argentina a month or so ago in Malaysia."

If it looked a bit scrappy at times, collisions are bound to happen in a fast-moving game with a small yellow ball and a big blue pitch. "I'm proud to be associated with this game because it's on the edge at all times," Lee continued. "There's nobody in world hockey that plays with anything other than dignity, as well as a desire to win."

Of course both teams were asked about the political context, but no dice: "I hope the biggest motivation," said Lee, "was that if they didn't play right, and didn't win, I was going to rip their heads off."

Coach Pablo Lombi said simply, "It was a long time ago."

Well, it was in May. But maybe two months is a really long time in hockey.

'A hard defeat'

Argentina's defeat in the hockey stung in the aftermath of the bravado shown by its government three months ago in a TV ad that showed former Argentine Olympic hockey star Fernando Zylberberg training on the Falkland Islands for the London Games.

Argentinian internet commentators rubbed salt in the wound, pointing out that Zylberberg could not compete in London due to injuries. "They left him out of the team and on top of that his team gets a solid beating by the British," wrote Alan Fontan on the Clarín website. "It's always the same. Loudmouths motivate the rival team to be better. The government has to learn that sports and politics don't mix."

Headlines in the press conveyed the grim spirits. "A hard defeat," said the daily Clarín, remarking that the Argentine team seemed nervous during their Olympic debut, and criticising them for having "few attack ideas" and making "a number of defence mistakes".